Elon Musk Warns Twitter Employees They Have a Deadline to Get ‘Extremely Hardcore’ or They’re Fired

HANNIBAL HANSCHKE/POOL/AFP via Getty Images)

Twitter employees have until Thursday evening to get “extremely hardcore” or they’re headed out the door, new owner Elon Musk reportedly warned the company in a memo this week.

Musk laid out his high standards for employee performances in the email, which was obtained by The Washington Post, which includes “working long hours at high intensity.”

“Going forward, to build a breakthrough Twitter 2.0 and succeed in an increasingly competitive world, we will need to be extremely hardcore. This will mean working long hours at high intensity. Only exceptional performance will constitute a passing grade,” Musk wrote.

The memo directs employees to a link to some kind of form and any in the company that are not willing to roll with Twitter’s “more engineering-driven” future can collect three months severance and leave.

Those who write “great code,” Musk said, “will constitute the majority of our team and have the greatest sway” going forward.

In his memo, Musk also wrote Twitter is a “software and servers” company “at its heart.”

“If you are sure that you want to be part of the new Twitter, please click on the link below,” Musk wrote. After he provided the link, he warned that any employees that have not done so by Thursday evening will be dismissed.

“Whatever decision you make, thank you for your efforts to make Twitter successful,” he ended the memo with. The subject line for the warning was “a fork in the road.”

Musk’s message to employees follow a turbulent start to his ownership of Twitter, which has included mass firings and public tensions with employees. Major changes to the platform are needed, Musk has warned, as it was losing millions a day when he stepped into his role. Former CEO Jack Dorsey admitted he mismanaged the company and grew it too fast in a message to employees after Musk’s takeover.